I received a hurt and angry email from someone I care about.

Someone who usually tells me they find my emails helpful and inspiring.

They said please can I stop sending such guilt-inducing emails.

Ouch!

I was almost triggered into shame and self-flagellation at doing something 'wrong', because I felt sadness that they were hurt but...

The people who signed up for my six-week guided experience said it was like I was speaking directly to them and they felt huge relief that someone understood.

And we had our first meeting this week and it was really special.

So to some people my emails felt positive.

But this friend's reaction to my emails left me thoughtful. Because it poked on an issue I know I have work to do on.

You already know about me and marketing...

We have an uncomfortable relationship.

I keep trying to find ways to make peace with it, and find my own voice and truth in it, and I am increasingly doing so, but it's really challenging.

You see, mainstream marketing teaches you to sell stuff by inducing guilt and fear. In the same way you probably use guilt and fear to make yourself go to the gym or eat better or do your taxes.

And that is SO not what I'm about.

I'm about helping you find the strength and skills and courage to make your own choices and listen to your inner truth for guidance.

So using fear and guilt to encourage you to join my courses doesn't make any sense.

I want my marketing to be an extension of my work and an offering of my gifts that helps you even as I remind you of what's on offer.

But owning and using your own voice amidst any kind of mainstream thinking is HARD, isn't it?

I am sloooowly learning how to do it, but I haven't nailed it yet.

Fear, guilt and shame are such common motivators - also in me. So sometimes it comes across in my messages.

One day, when I'm grown, I will be able to offer my gifts only in a truly non-coercive and inspiring way.

But before I can do that, I have to learn to be so TOTALLY ok with myself, that I don't feel afraid of being seen.

In other words, I have to learn to give myself FULL permission to exist.

I'm getting there, but I still sometimes feel awkward and apologetic about 'selling' something.

And pained that I still run the narrative that says 'marketing' is separate from my 'real' work.

This work that I love so much.

That I will comfortably stand on a hundred stages and roar about how important it is.

That I will sit in a thousand groups and weep tears of gratitude as I witness people

transform into more peace and wholeness with themselves as they ALLOW in their choices.

But that I still cringe at when having to tell people how it will help them so much to join my groups.

So sometimes my offers still carry the energy of fear and insecurity and not only my heart.

And for now, that's ok.

I'm learning, you see?

And nobody learns gracefully.

So all I can do is walk my talk. Listen to your feedback, be very honest with myself, and tune into my loving inner guidance to know what to do next.

Right now my inner guidance is telling me to be very kind to myself about not pleasing everyone and doing things in a way that don't feel a hundred percent me yet. She says I'm learning and that it's ok. And anyone who really knows me understands I mean no harm, even if sometimes I accidentally cause it.

If I loved myself, I'd be gentle with me as I learn.

What about you?

If you loved yourself, how would you be gentle with yourself as you learn to express your authentic voice?